While We’re Waiting… Is winning the only thing?

While We’re Waiting serves as the early morning gathering of WFNY-esque information for your viewing pleasure. Have something you think we should see? Send it to our tips email at tips@waitingfornextyear.com.

“Already, it feels like a decade ago that the nation collectively decided that LeBron James was a horrible human being and deserved to suffer in public for our amusement. (I was at the forefront of this). Then he went out and won a championship, and not only did we all decide that he could win a championship after all, we all came to the conclusion that, hey, he was a pretty swell guy, too. That people still love and revere Michael Jordan is the ultimate proof of this; I’m pretty sure he’s the most miserable person on Earth, perhaps the textbook example of why winning, and the thirst to win, is corrosive to one’s soul. The reason Lance Armstrong is doomed to be hated the rest of his life has less to do with his offenses and more to do with the fact that he’s too old now to go out and win another Tour de France to make us forgive everything again. You name the offense, and we’ve forgiven it, or at least conveniently forgot about it, in the name of winning.

I find this less hypocritical than I probably should, if just because what an athlete is like, as a person, matters to me a lot less than I suspect it does to a lot of other people. It’s not particularly logical to care about athletes’ personalities. The only reason we care about athletes in the first place is because of what they do on the playing field. We may learn, and come to like and admire, certain things about them during the course of watching those sporting events, but the reason we even are paying attention in the first place is because of the games. And as we’ve discovered time and time and time again, even though we might think we know these athletes as people by watching them play, we don’t. The only thing we can count on them for is winning, and losing. Everything else is just image management. Wanting to know these guys is begging for disappointment. They are, after all, human beings, as tough as it can be sometimes to accept that.” [Leitch/Sports On Earth]

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5 predictions for the Tribe- “3. Carlos Santana will hit 30 home runs for the first time in his career. This might be more difficult to see happening only because Santana will see less playing time this season. With Reynolds, Swisher and more to share some time at DH and first-base, Santana will see a few more off-days mixed in to keep him fresher. However, after an extremely disappointing first half in ‘12, Santana rebounded for a monster second half. Now surrounded by legitimate protection, the switch-hitting catchers should see a lot more pitches to hit and his home run totals should flourish.” [Zuppe/ESPN Cleveland]

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From the Indians’ media guide- “Chris Perez’s middle name is Ralph, which is exactly what he did on the mound after one of his saves last year. Want some truly obscure trivia? In the last 10 years, just two rookies or sophomores have hit five home runs in the first eight games of the season. One is Miguel Cabrera (with the Marlins in ’04) and the other is Mark Reynolds (with the D-backs in ’08).” [Castrovince/MLB.com]

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Ha! What a great memory- “The legend has grown over the years. Appalachian State used just 27 players in the game, or probably the amount of former high school stars on Michigan’s bench who never saw any action that afternoon. The Mountaineers almost blew that game by its clock management. It kicked the go-ahead field goal but left 26 seconds on the clock, giving Michigan enough time to drive downfield and try a field goal for the win as people scrambled to find the Big Ten Network on their televisions (it was the first game broadcast by the network). [Schwaub/Dr. Saturday]

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“I think it’s time for the Browns to go get cornerback Brent Grimes from the Falcons. The Browns had Grimes him in town a week ago and reportedly brought his family in with him in a private jet. He left Cleveland without a contract. Earlier this week, league sources said he was down to re-signing with the Falcons, the Dolphins or the Browns.

Sources close to the player say that Grimes is serious about the Browns and is taking his time trying to decide where to make his comeback. It also doesn’t hurt that the Browns brought his former teammate Owens in last week. The Falcons have a reported $6.2 million under the cap, but that number is likely to be reduced with the signing of defensive end Osi Umenyiura on Wednesday.” [Greetham/The OBR]

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I tweeted this yesterday and was surprised nobody else picked up on it…I happened to be listening to Triv’s show in the car (everything else was on commercial) and he and Andre Knott were spinning the loss of the Browns by WTAM. Andre was saying now he could report the “truth”. He gave an example (his words) “The reason Josh Cribbs didn’t play offense more…he was stupid and couldn’t learn the plays.” My mouth dropped…

And intelligent enough to play quarterback at a division 1 university…

jewpants47

i find it ridiculous how much weight is given to a players potential “upside” (Butch Davis im looking at you) when it comes to the draft, but not so much in FA. I get it that a player has shown what he can do at the NFL level (to varying degrees of playing time) but why not pick up CB Grimes? Seems like he has tremendous upside if healthy. I’de think cap and cash is less valuable and less risky than a 1,2,3rd draft pick – so why not throw some money his way and give it a year to see. at worst you’ve added depth to a questionable secondary.

My friend just moved to Humboldt Ave. Couldn’t quite place why it seemed so familiar, but I think I just figured it out.

humboldt

Nice! I was actually at Humboldt University in Berlin when I learned about WFNY. Nice to know the name has become part of the collective consciousness on the blog – we are a small and only mildly dysfunctional family aren’t we?

I know. The spittle crowd loves decrying Quicken's loan practices...and by way of association....Gilbert. From what I know of Gilbert, I think it's a bit unfair. Also, the guy is almost single handedly revitalizing Detroit by making huge investments, redevelopment, etc. He's putting his money where his mouth is in that passion project....if he was […]

What was McCown's record last year? 1 / 8. Would you buy any product from a company if you knew that only 11 % of their products work? Would you eat at a restaurant iF you knew that only 11 % of the meals they served were edible, and the other 89 % were garbage? […]